Numa Roumestan

“ How could Numa divine that any danger threatened from the pretty little girl whom he had seen from his carriage window crossing the courtyard several days before, jumping over the puddles, holding her umbrella in one hand and her coquettish skirts gathered up in the other, with all the smartness of a true Parisian woman, her long lashes curving above a saucy, turned-up nose, her blond hair, twisted in an American knot behind, which the moist air had turned to curls at the ends, and her shapely, finely-curved leg quite at ease above her high-heeled boot—that was all he had seen of her. ”

“ Poor Numa was in almost as deep despair as she was. The hope of a little Roumestan, “the eldest,” who is always a great personage in Provençal families, was gone forever, destroyed by his own fault. The pale face of his wife with its resigned expression, her compressed lips and smothered sobs, nearly broke his heart—her grief was so different from his way of acting, from the coarse, superficial sensibility that he showed as he sat at the foot of his victim’s bed, saying at intervals with swimming eyes and trembling lips, “Come now, Rosalie, come now!” ”

“ He came to be as well known as Numa himself. This type of parasite is not uncommon in Paris; each great man has a Bompard dragging at his heels, who walks on in his shadow and comes to have a kind of personality reflected from that of his patron. It was a mere chance that Roumestan’s Bompard really had a personality of his own, not a reflection of his master. Rosalie detested this intruder on her happiness, always between her and her husband, appropriating to himself the few precious moments that might have been hers alone. ”

“ Bompard, Roumestan’s mameluke, has the honorary position of a fourth secretary who does outside business, goes to look for news and sings his patron’s praises about the streets. This occupation does not seem to be a lucrative one, judging from his appearance, but that is really not Numa’s fault. Aside from the midday meal and an occasional half-louis, this singular kind of parasite could never be induced to accept anything; and how he supported existence remained as great a mystery as ever to his best friends. ”

“ Very calm, he made no answer, but let the storm blow over, took his instruments from their cases, his fife and mouth-piece with its ivory tip, and rubbed them well with a bit of cloth for fear of dampness and promised to try at the Ministry again to-morrow, and, if he could not see Numa, ask to see Mme. Roumestan.
“O, vaï! Mme. Roumestan! You know she does not like your music—but the young lady, though—she will be sure to help you; yes indeed!” ”

“ His aunt’s brow darkened above her big eyes, flaming like those of a Japanese idol.
“The landau? Avai! What for? At least you’re not going to take your wife and sister to see that player of the tutu-panpan!”
This word “tutu-panpan” so perfectly mimicked the sound of the fife and tabor that Roumestan burst out laughing, but Hortense took up the defence of the old Provençal tabor with much earnestness. Nothing that she had seen in the South had impressed her so much. Besides, it would not be honest to break one’s word to the nice boy.
“He is a great artist! Numa, you said so yourself.” ”

“ If Mme. Roumestan had ever shared the illusions of the Faubourg she did so no longer, judging from her look of disenchantment and the little smile with which she listened to her husband’s [15] words, a smile paler with melancholy than with disdain. But he left them suddenly, attracted by the sound of some peculiar music that came to them from the arena below. The crowd in great excitement was on its feet shouting “Valmajour! Valmajour!”
Having taken the musicians’ prize the day before, the famous Valmajour, the greatest taborist of Provence, had come to honor Numa with his finest airs. ”

“ And then her Numa, so changed, so good, quite cured of his brutality and violence! To be sure he still showed weaknesses which she did not like, those roundabout Italian ways which he could not help having, but, even as he said—“O, that?—that is politics!” Besides that, she was no longer the victim of the illusions of her early years; she knew that in order to live happily one must be contented with coming near to what one desires in everything and that complete happiness can only be quarried from the half-happinesses which existence affords us. ”

“ In the falling shades of night and the steam of dampness which the rain threw up from the hurrying crowd, in this great jostling crowd the poor boy seemed so lost, exiled and overwhelmed by the tall, unfriendly buildings around him—he seemed so pitifully unlike the handsome Valmajour at the door of his mas, giving the rhythm to the locusts with his tabor, that Roumestan turned away his head and, for a few moments, a feeling of remorse threw a cloud over the radiant pathway of his triumph. ”

“ Each of these things has been better than the last, with the exception, perhaps, of L’Evangéliste, which, to my taste, is not superior to Numa Roumestan. Numa Roumestan is a masterpiece; it is really a perfect work; it has no weakness, no roughness; it is a compact and harmonious whole. Daudet’s other works have had their inequalities, their infirmities, certain places where, if you tapped them, they sounded hollow. His danger has always been a perceptible tendency to the factitious; sometimes he has fallen into the trap laid for him by a taste for superficial effects. ”

“ For the sake of that single line on which Roumestan’s name is written the Mèfres would toss the whole book into the fire. He it is who represents best their ideas in religion, politics and everything. It is just as Mme. Mèfre says, and she is more enthusiastic than her husband:
“For that man, I tell you, anybody would imperil their eternal soul.”
They are very fond of recalling the period when Numa, already on the road to fame, did not disdain to come there himself to buy his stores. ”

“ But was there not still a perfume of delicate beauty, a charming Italian coquetry pervading this landscape of the Alpilles, like the quiver of a lute or viol floating through the pure, still air?
Numa grew excited, forgetting that he had only his sister-in-law and old Ménicle’s blue cloak for audience, and, after a few commonplaces fit for local banquets and meetings of the Academy, broke forth into one of those ingenious and brilliant impromptus that proved him to be indeed the descendant of the light Provençal troubadours. ”

“ No one has such grace, such lightness and brilliancy of execution; it is a fascination to see him at work. The beauty of Numa Roumestan is that it has no hollow places; the idea and the picture melt everywhere into one. Emile Zola, criticising the work in a very friendly spirit, speaks of the episode of Hortense Le Quesnoy and the Provençal tambourinaire as a false note, and declares that it wounds his sense of delicacy. ”

“ In this extremely choice language peculiar to noblemen and soldiers he indicated young De Lappara, sitting modestly in a corner of the carriage with Numa’s portfolio on his lap, respectfully silent in the company of the big-wigs.
Roumestan felt piqued, he did not know exactly why, and replied hotly. In his opinion there were many other things that women preferred to youth in a man. ”

“ Numa’s success was paid for by costs and imprisonment. So from the ashes of many a play that has ruined manager and author one actor may snatch a reputation. [32] Old Sagnier, who had come to hear Numa plead, embraced his pupil before the assembled crowd. “Count yourself from this day on a great man, my dear Numa!” said he, and seemed surprised that he had hatched such a falcon’s egg. But the most surprised man was Numa himself, as with the echo of his own words still sounding in his ears he descended the broad railless staircase of the Palais de Justice, quite stunned, as if in a dream. ”

“ Northern accents and Southern accents, divers opinions and sentiments, swarming ambitions and intrigues, the noisy tramp of the restless crowd—this waiting-room with its delays and uncertainties was an appropriate theatre for politics, this tumult of a journey at a fixed hour which would soon, at bid of the whistle, be speeding over the rails down a perspective of tracks, disks and locomotives, over a country full of accidents and surprises.
Five minutes later he saw Numa enter, leaning on the arm of one of his secretaries who carried [125] his portfolio. ”

“ Hidden away in his coach in order to escape ovations, Roumestan enjoyed immensely all this [374] jollity, pleased with the sight of these countenances all brown and hooked-nosed and alive with emotion and sarcasm, these big fellows with their smart air, these chatos as amber-colored as the long berries of the muscat grape, who as they grow older will turn into these crones, black and dried by the sun, who seem to scatter a dust as from the tomb every time they make one of their habitual gestures. ”

“ In that little gray house the great orator first saw the light on the 15th of July, 1832; it was easy to draw more than one parallel between his narrow, classical talent and his education as a Catholic and a Legitimist, and that little house of needy citizens with a convent on one side and a seignorial residence on the other, and a provincial academy in front of it.
Roumestan was filled with emotion, as he always was over anything concerning himself. He had not visited this spot for perhaps thirty years; it needed the whim of this young girl to bring him here. ”

“ I respect all forms of religion—but if there is one thing more detestable in this world than another, it is hypocrisy and deceit.”
Unconsciously her voice rose warm and vibrating; her rather cold features beamed with a glow of honesty and rectitude and flushed with righteous indignation.
“Hush, hush,” said Numa pointing towards the door. Perhaps it was not perfectly just; he allowed that old Dansaert had rendered good service to his country; but what was to be done? He had given his word.
“Take it back,” said Rosalie. “Come, Numa, for my sake—I implore you!” ”

“ An excellent person, all things considered, ardent, generous, with a great desire to please and to sacrifice herself—a noble trait in these impulsive people, and one by which Numa had profited. Since he had been chosen deputy the house on the Place Cavalerie belonged to him, his aunt only reserving the right to remain there the rest of her life. And then, what a delight it was to her when the party from Paris arrived, with the receptions, the visits, the morning music and the serenades which the presence of the great man brought into that lonely life of hers, eager for excitement! ”

“ But Bompard was so well trained to his business of shadow that even at that time of night Numa found him ready to warm up and be indignant in sympathy with him and to express, with his magnificent head under the silken ends of a night scarf, the emotions of anger, irony or sorrow, according as the talk fell upon the false eyelashes of the artificial little girl, on her sixteen years, which certainly were equal to twenty-four, or on the immorality of a mother who could take part in such scandalous orgies. ”

“ Wonderful{236} are the delicacy, the verity, the tenderness of these pages; we always point to them to justify our predilection. But we must stop pointing. We will not say more of Numa Roumestan than we have already said; for it is better to pass so happy a work by than to speak of it inadequately. We will only repeat that we delight in Numa Roumestan. Alphonse Daudet’s last book is a novelty at the time I write; L’Evangéliste has been before the public but a month or two. ”

“ Thought I in meself—look there, Valmajour, there’s a little birrd o’ God whose throat alone is equal to all the trills. Now, what he can do with one stop, can’t you accomplish with the three holes in your little flute?”
He talked quietly, with a perfectly confident tone of voice, without a suspicion of being ridiculous. No one indeed would have dared to smile in the face of Numa’s enthusiasm, for he was throwing up his arms and stamping so that he almost went through the platform. “How handsome he is! What an artist!” ”

“ She sees him with her imagination, and especially in the light of your legends and inventions which she has not been able to put in the right focus. That is why this advertisement and grotesque coloring which enrage you fill me on the contrary with joy. I believe that her hero will appear so ridiculous to her that she will no longer dare to love him. If it were not for that, I hardly know what would become of us. Can you imagine the despair of my father; can you imagine yourself the brother-in-law of Valmajour?—oh, Numa, Numa! ”

“ My dear Numa! I get on so well with him; he is so lively, so gay! How we shall chat together about our Rosalie and the serious motive which prevents her from travelling at this time—O great Heavens, that was a secret!—and poor mamma, who has made me swear so often about it! she is the one who will be glad enough to see dear Numa again. On this occasion she quite lost every sort of timidity or modesty; you ought to have seen the majesty with which she entered the office of the hotel in order to take an apartment for her son-in-law, the Minister! ”

“ Nevertheless, that evening he had another attack of moodiness on the train returning from Versailles with some of his colleagues of the Cabinet. In the heated carriage where every one was smoking they were discussing, in the free and easy manner that Numa always carried about with him, a certain orange-colored velvet bonnet in the diplomats’ gallery that framed a pale Creole face ”

“ There lies the cruelty that poets exercise; they lull and appease you, but then with one word they envenom again the wound which they were by way of healing.
She saw herself as she was in that same place twelve years before when Numa paid his addresses to her with great big bouquets of roses; when, clothed with her twenty years and the wish to be beautiful for his sake, from that very window she watched him coming, just as one watches one’s own destiny. ”